Guild Wars 2

It’s been eight years and I’ve yet to enjoy the Crystal Desert in Guild Wars 1. lol

I joke! I joke!

On a completely serious note, there were, all up, 300 quests in Prophecies…alogether. There are 300 hearts and 1500 dynamic events in Guild Wars 2. I don’t see how you you think that the Crystal Desert with it’s tiny number of quests could take the same time to create now, with the change of format.

Parisalchuk.9230:

Azure.8670:

He’s right honestly. Even if there are things you HATE about this game, and you want it to get better because youre a fan, theres just better ways to say things XIV on and off lately and that game honestly sucks, but the community is SOOO supportive of the game its amazing. SQENIX has been horrrrible to their fans for almost a decade and people still support them. ANET tries really hard to make a lot of fans happy, in a game thats three pronged. just be respectful and remember that this is a work in progress. Things game time and this is a great game whether things about it kitten you off or not.

A video game should not be a work in progress the same way your car shouldnt be a work in progress once its released… In an ideal world the game would have had the foundation for their 2 week release cycles prior to release and the game would have included all the basic features it needed (like leaderboards and custom servers for PvP) right from the start. When you release a half developed game as one of the most anticipated games your gonna have a bad time. Shame on us for expecting a AAA title to actually be AAA in quality.

A driving game shouldn’t be a work in progress. Every MMO ever made is a work in progress…not just at release but through the entire life cycle of the game, as long as it’s viable.

When you buy a driving game, you’re buying a game. When you’re buying an MMO you’re buying access to a world…you’re not paying for the program you’re paying for the account. It’s a completely different thing.

There isn’t one MMO I’ve ever seen, AAA or otherwise, that released as a finished product.

Arnath.2319:

First step to building a stronger relationship between developers and the community: admit your mistakes.

Instead of writing this post ArenaNet you should have made a post admitting the hundreds of mistakes you have made over the past year, apologise, then promise to make things better.

Because everything that you think is a mistake is a mistake? I think not.

Calling something a mistake doesn’t make it one. To be sure, mistakes have been made…but that’s true of every game, every person on the planet. Some mistakes are probably more significant than others, but I’m 100% sure everything people call a mistake isn’t one.

MikaHR.1978:

Gnat.9405:

when you take the game for what it is

This was used for every failed game since WoW.

When i hear this phrase i know things have gone south.

“It was supposed to be a great game, but if you take it for what it is itll be fine”

And what it is? Medicore, not really good, not all bad, but yeah. And then they wonder why 90% of people quit the game in 1-3 months. Becasue, you know, “if you take it for what it is” lol

I’ve heard the very same thing said about every successful game when someone complained about it, including WoW.

I used to complain about WoW and my friend would say, take it for what it is. It’s such a natural response.

Are you suggesting that WoW is failing because someone said that about WoW?

Guild Wars 2 isn’t other games. It’s what it is. Some people like what it is. If ENOUGH people like what it is, it will be successful. Of course those people who like it are going to say take it as it is…not because it’s mediocre, but because they don’t want the changes you want.

Kaiyanwan.8521:

Dyes are char bound. Very alt-unfriendly.

And try to keep more than one character up to date with all the new ascended stuff, good luck (and yeah, ascended armor is coming in a week)…

Not compared to Guild Wars 1, where each use of a dye consumed it and you needed a dye for each piece of armor.

By contrast, unlocking a dye for a character is far far better than it ever was in Guild Wars 1. It’s a major improvement.

champ.7021:

Vayne.8563:

champ.7021:

Vayne.8563:

Wukunlin.8461:

in which case healers should heal enemies too

Magic is different from physical stuff. It’s easy enough to make a spell to heal those who say are not hostile to you…because you make hostility the trigger to not heal that person. By the same token, it’s hard to make an ax or greatsword sympathetic to other people.

Aaaah i see what vayne wants. He wants this game to be like real life, where magic only affects those you want it to. I mean come on wunkunlin where have you been. Every time a cleric guardian heals someone in real life they only heal allies. You should know this….By the same token every time i go out into san francsico with my berserker armor and a greatsword axe mace build i always end up hitting and killing a friend kind of sad but if its in real life it should be in gw2

You don’t get the genre, and that’s okay. You haven’t studied the genre…I have.

There is a framework set up called world-building in any fantasy narrative and certain things are accepted as true. As long as they remain consistent they can be believed, because they are always true.

There is no real life mechanism for magic, so its up to each creator to define magic. There are, however, real life swords and beserkers. Without some kind of explanation as to how something amazing can be done…you’re asking people to suspend disbelieve more by changing the laws of physics in a non-magical way.

Plausibility and realism aren’t the same thing.

holy kitten you were for realsies?!?!?!

Nah, the whole thing was tongue in cheek…but I was having fun.

Still I like the conversation that ensued, particularly the idea of damage reflect or something along those lines.

As people rightly pointed out, it isn’t berserker that’s the problem, it’s the fact that the encounters are designed in such a way that beserker is king. That really needs to change.

gumoor.5674:

I can’t tell you how many branded charr and humans I killed with my jaw just opening further and further. I was killing them ad nauseum just as a joke because they would drop something like every 30 kills….and it would be a radiant dust. Something is very wrong here.

That’s all I get from branded creatures too for the most part.

haviz.1340:

Vayne.8563:

You mean like players can be knocked off cliffs and enemies can’t. It’s a game…I’m proposing a solution to a perceived problem.

Trying to throw logic at an idea that will fix a problem doesn’t cut it.

It’s not a problem but a symptom and you’re not proposing anything, you’re just trolling. And it’s a breach of Code of Conduct.

• Do not submit “trolling” posts or threads. We define “trolling” as commenting in a manner intended to elicit overly strong negative and emotional responses for mere shock value, attempting to derail threads, persistently posting off-topic, or engaging in personal attacks on another forum member. Accounts made with the sole intent to “troll” will be terminated.

First of all, the problem is a real one if the forums are to be believed. There have been far too many posts about it. If the game is structured so that berserker gear is the only logical/reasonable choice, that’s a problem with the game. I merely suggested a possible solution.

It would allow players soloing to run around in whatever they want, but wouldn’t allow the stacking of berserkers on a boss, thus trivializing it.

Since then, other people have suggested other things that would work including damage reflection…but it would have to be more than just a small percentage. The damage reflection would have to be serious enough to do possibly cause a wipe (or the problem will remain).

Ashen.2907:

Vayne.8563:

Trying to throw logic at an idea that will fix a problem doesn’t cut it.

Perhaps, but he was attempting to throw logic at an idea that would not fix a problem.

How would it not fix the problem?

serialkicker.5274:

Wukunlin.8461:

in which case healers should heal enemies too

In which case enemies should damage their allies too or should magic just work for players?

You mean like players can be knocked off cliffs and enemies can’t. It’s a game…I’m proposing a solution to a perceived problem.

Trying to throw logic at an idea that will fix a problem doesn’t cut it.

DR shouldn’t kick if if you’re not standing in the same zones. You don’t get DR unless you kill the same stuff over and over. If you’re moving around, DR shouldn’t be an issue.

I have a question. Do you have another character on your account that you can play and test to see if you’re getting different drops on it.

I’ve heard the theory that some characters have better “luck” than others. Not to say it’s true, but it would be interesting to test.

I sort of think I have luckier characters and unluckier ones.

Asuka Shikinami.5462:

Nage.1520:

Asuka Shikinami.5462:

People are angry for a reason.
People hate temporary content for a reason.
People hate ascended gear for a reason.
People hate class imbalance for a reason.
People hate server imbalance for a reason.
People hate constant buggy content for a reason.
People hate watching you making the same mistakes over and over for a reason.

Why don’t you understand that?

You make it sound like no one at all likes the changes. People don’t hate these things, some people do, at least in regards to temporary content and ascended gear. Some things you call mistakes, other people quite like. The balance stuff, well yeah, that needs a whole lot of work…but if you keep using the world people as if everyone things the same, you completely lose any kind of credibility.

Agreed, some people do like them. Also some people like exploiting and some people like hacking. When we refer to large groups of people their is always going to be variation about opinions on a subject, particularly if it involves change. My post did not state that every player or forum reader shared a collective opinion or my own. I did use plural terms, however given the nature of these terms and the amount of evidence that these points are shared by a considerable number of people on the forums, I believe said usage is justified.

The points I am referring to are the ones which are constantly brought up in the forums and attract a lot of negative feedback – again for a reason. If people like said content, I am also sure they have a reason for liking it. If people are angry, and are angry for a reason, maybe that reason should be considered instead of just making condescending threads about how you want people to agree with your approach.

If there were polls on these subjects, on the forums, I think we would find an overwhelming majority of people don’t like many of these points. We could say that this is only representative of the people posting in the forums not the game altogether, however this thread is only targeted towards the people in this forum.

tldr; Semantics aside, people are angry for a reason. Said changes have affected a lot of people in negative ways and they respond with negativity. If Anet doesn’t expect that or think it’s warranted giving the nature of some of these changes, they need to spend more time trying to understand their forum community and less time enforcing group think. This tldr is far too long.

I think you’re wrong about the usage being justified. Because you don’t really know how many people like something.

Assuming that people come to the forums to complain, you’re naturally going to see more complaints on the forum. It’s not an accurate indication of the entire player base…only a very vocal percentage of the playerbase.

Saying people are mad and that gives them the right to act badly is wrong anyway.

Nage.1520:

guanlongwucaii.3162:

vayne i think anet should hire you

I don’t think Anet would ever hire that guy. Why would they?

I hope they don’t hire me…I’d have to behave. lol

Charak.9761:

Vayne.8563:

Totally wrong. There’s plenty of new stuff…quality of life stuff, stuff that has changed. There’s new jumping puzzles, a brand new dungeon path, there’s zone wide Scarlet invasions, there’s new PvP maps, there’s all sorts of new stuff.

You have people on these forums who are unhappy because they don’t like some of the design decisions Anet has made…but the game has progressed…just not in the direction everyone likes.

For example, ascended weapons have been introduced, which require more grind than some people want to do. But it’s still far less grind than legendary weapons.

In addition, a minigame rotation has been added to the game, four mini games rotate.

Dailies have changed, monthlies have changed…those who say it hasn’t changed are not just wrong…they’re demonstrably wrong.

-One new jumping puzzle, aetherblade’s
-The new dungeon has no replay after achievements, the rewards are off-based compared to the time spent. It was replaced an existing path, so it’s not additional* content.
-invasions were only worthwhile during the LS, when you could zerg farm them, now they are less frequent with less people to scale up mobs to multiple champions
-Skyhammer is poorly executed pvp design, an 8000 laser spike every 5 seconds from whomever controls it?
-Crafting to 500 cost 150-200g in materials, Ascended weapons cost 20g
-The daily system with the addition of achievement chests have turned this game into an Achievement Simulator (like a AH simulator of D3), where people only log on for the AP and logoff because there’s nothing else to do.

The new dungeon path is CERTAINLY addition content. Half the path it replaced is virtually identical to an already existing path of the same dungeon. Everything in the new dungeon path is new, including new mechanics, and more interesting bosses that require more teamwork. And the idea that there’s more to do in a dungeon besides finish it (the extra stuff at the end) is also completely new.

There was one new jumping puzzle, if you don’t count the one in November, Dierdre’s garden. There were also 30 dynamic events added at that time.

I don’t know about you,. but I get somewhere between 15 and 30 champion bags during invasions still. Maybe you need to look at your build or your strategy.

The daily achievement system reward chests were something people were asking for. That you don’t have to do them all for laurels and you can choose the five achievements you want is something people have been asking for. That you don’t have to do all the monthly achievements and you can pick four is something people have been asking for.

The account wallet is massively convenient and a big QoL improvement. Getting rid of culling is a big improvement as well, in both WvW and PvE. Some people don’t like the WxP stuff in WvW, but quite a few people do because it gives them something to work towards. Some people don’t like the ruins in WvW and some people do…oh yes that’s new too.

Guild Missions are some of the most fun I’ve had in this game, particularly puzzles and rushes…oh wait, aren’t those puzzles also jumping puzzles. You seem to have forgotten about them.

Even the moa races are new and offer a different kind of content for people who like that sort of thing.

But the bottom line is, you pick and choose what you personally like or don’t like and use that as an excuse to say there’s been no new content and that everything is the same.

I submit if everything was the same, people wouldn’t be complaining on the forums about how stuff is changing.

Toby.2357:

Does Anet really listen to the community tho? People mentioned that living story isnt working:
*Its to temporary
*The quality of the content is very low due pressure from rushed schedule on release
*Tha amount of content given isnt exactly enjoyable because every update is ‘’New achievement chores, go there, click F, rinse repeat’’
*The story is poorly written

I got in to gw2 with alot of hopes during headstart. But now I just ride along because nothing else interests me. The community wanted a expansion, they said no, they said living story would be equal to expansion, but so far every content given is being taken out so it dosent really equal to an expansion, expansion are usealy permanent and quality work. We were promised permanent content, all we got was teq and a new dungeon path in which they removed a diffrent path to implement it. They claim to listen to the community, but it dosent show yet. Still there is hope i guess 2014 is close, i really want to know what they have planned for us in the first half of 2014.

Are you saying Tequatl and the new dungeon path aren’t permanent. Are you saying they’re not good. The new dungeon path in particular is very good.

And they have ways to get unique items from that content you can’t get anywhere else…which is something people have been asking for.

They’re starting to listen, but making stuff takes a lot longer than asking for it.

champ.7021:

Vayne.8563:

Wukunlin.8461:

in which case healers should heal enemies too

Magic is different from physical stuff. It’s easy enough to make a spell to heal those who say are not hostile to you…because you make hostility the trigger to not heal that person. By the same token, it’s hard to make an ax or greatsword sympathetic to other people.

Aaaah i see what vayne wants. He wants this game to be like real life, where magic only affects those you want it to. I mean come on wunkunlin where have you been. Every time a cleric guardian heals someone in real life they only heal allies. You should know this….By the same token every time i go out into san francsico with my berserker armor and a greatsword axe mace build i always end up hitting and killing a friend kind of sad but if its in real life it should be in gw2

You don’t get the genre, and that’s okay. You haven’t studied the genre…I have.

There is a framework set up called world-building in any fantasy narrative and certain things are accepted as true. As long as they remain consistent they can be believed, because they are always true.

There is no real life mechanism for magic, so its up to each creator to define magic. There are, however, real life swords and beserkers. Without some kind of explanation as to how something amazing can be done…you’re asking people to suspend disbelieve more by changing the laws of physics in a non-magical way.

Plausibility and realism aren’t the same thing.

morrolan.9608:

nethykins.7986:

Thanks for this post Chris – though I think you have to be “black and white” and your choices you’ve made in game.

So far, what i’ve seen is:
- Ascended gear was added not because we asked for it (in fact, you guys stated you didn’t want to be like other games and add another tier of gear), instead it was because you found that people were gaining their legendaries too fast for you too curb. You underestimated player’s potential then fumbled and released something which Anet had openly said, they’d wished they’d released it in a better fashion.

Not to mention stating that there would be multiple ways of getting ascended items then implementing it such that there is 1 major way of getting each ascended item and maybe a couple of other ways that cost significantly more. If we interpreted what Chris said then perhaps he should have explained it further. Seriously its not hard to see why there’s anger here.

Why does anger have to equal disrespect? I get angry sometimes, but that doesn’t mean I have to be disrespectful.

No one is saying not to have feelings about the game. But expressing those feels in a derogatory manner (and by the way I’ve never seen you do that), shouldn’t be allowed or acceptable.

Wukunlin.8461:

in which case healers should heal enemies too

Magic is different from physical stuff. It’s easy enough to make a spell to heal those who say are not hostile to you…because you make hostility the trigger to not heal that person. By the same token, it’s hard to make an ax or greatsword sympathetic to other people.

Totally wrong. There’s plenty of new stuff…quality of life stuff, stuff that has changed. There’s new jumping puzzles, a brand new dungeon path, there’s zone wide Scarlet invasions, there’s new PvP maps, there’s all sorts of new stuff.

You have people on these forums who are unhappy because they don’t like some of the design decisions Anet has made…but the game has progressed…just not in the direction everyone likes.

For example, ascended weapons have been introduced, which require more grind than some people want to do. But it’s still far less grind than legendary weapons.

In addition, a minigame rotation has been added to the game, four mini games rotate.

Dailies have changed, monthlies have changed…those who say it hasn’t changed are not just wrong…they’re demonstrably wrong.

AtoBoss.2906:

lol, you must run a support guardian or something, no need to get sour. This has been discussed 10000x, but as you stated improve other stat combinations, make healing scale higher etc. Getting damaged for using a specific stat combo? What if using full vit gear meant 50% damage decrease?

Improving other stat combinations won’t make dungeons run faster and won’t stop bosses from being trivialized.

Having a single beserker warrior or guardian or mesmer or whatever in a party really isn’t a problem. It doesn’t make encounters in dungeons much more trivial. It’s when you start stacking all these beserkers in one party that they can mow down most bosses in seconds. Maybe that’s fun for a few speed runners, but it makes beserker the go to stats, and as a result, there’s less build variety. Even improving the healing and support won’t particularly help this situation since it’s better to just kill stuff fast for most people.

But when you think about what a beserker actually is, it’s someone who’s attacking in a frenzy.

I think if more than one person in full beserker gear, or predominantly is beserker are all attacking a boss at the same time, I think they should also start damaging each other.

Grins.

Problem solved.

This is basically what I’ve been saying all along. Instead of being rude, making up stuff, or using hyperbole (wild exaggeration) to try to make a point, if people stuck to facts and stated opinions in a non-derogatory way, those opinions would hold more traction.

The job that Anet devs have is impossible. Everyone wants to be listened to, but not everyone agrees. If they listen to group 1, then group 2 says Anet doesn’t listen to its fans. If they listen to group 2, then group 1 gets upset.

But so many come to these forums to deride the game, rather than help it grow…and that shouldn’t be acceptable to anyone.

So many people have called me on saying that the game is doing well, even when I’m only responding to a post that says the game is dying. We have about equal evidence, but apparently, people are willing to allow the dying post to go unmolested, while my response to that post gets attacked? Why? Because it’s fun to attack white knights…except it’s not about white knighting. It’s about keeping it honest.

The stuff Chris has said in this post, including how the living story is in its infancy and will need time to grow (I say the same thing about dungeons without the trinity)…it’s a learning curve for everyone…and a steep one.

Being respectful will make this community and these forums a more enjoyable place to post. If you just want to hate, you’re not helping anyone.

Too many people claim to say they post for the good of the game, but post in ways which can’t do anything but hurt the game.

Devata.6589:

eisberg.2379:

Devata.6589:

eisberg.2379:

as to the topic at hand, I remember an interview with Colin in 2011, in that interview Anet was not sure how exactly they were going to introduce all the new content, the only thing they knew for sure is the living story was going to introduce new content, but they were not sure if they would have expansions, or just add new content to be bought from the Gem store. So if before the game even released they were not sure if there would be expansions or not, there is no reason to believe that they are afraid to release expansions.

Are you sure that was in 2011. Because I did hear exactly the same interview. However that was this year. They where at that moment talking about that because they first announced they wanted to use the living story “if we do this correct we don’t ever get an expansion” and they got a lot of negative feedback about that. Before the release I never did hear them ever speak about the ‘living story’.

Have a look here: http://www.guildwars2hub.com/news/guild-wars-2-colin-johanson-twitch-transcript can’t find the interview itself.

I know that interview that you linked very well, and it is not the one I am talking about. Living story has been talked about long before the game released, and I do remember in 2011 an interview talking about how they will introduce new content, and living story was at that point the only one they knew for sure would be one way to introduce some content, they still were not sure how they would introduce other content. In that recent interview they showed they want to lean more towards introducing the same stuff in an expansion through the living story and do it over time instead of one big package.

What I recall from before release is that they talked about a ever evolving breading world, and usually they then where mainly talking about how dynamic events would so that. But I never did hear the term “living story” before and also never the discussion on if they would release new content that way.

Right, because they didn’t come up with the living story till after release.

They did try adding dynamic events and they, by and large, got ignored. So they brainstormed and came up with another approach.

Clearly they see the approach as successful…otherwise why would they have added teams to it.

What is successful?

I believe Anet looks at concurrency numbers and places a large stock in those.

The idea of the living story is that it’s a living story…Anet didn’t want to make it so people have to log in to follow the story. It was an intentional design decision so that people who came and went wouldn’t feel lost.

That doesn’t mean that big things can’t happen or won’t happen…but the living story was never supposed to further the main story or be the main story. If you expect it to, you’re bound to be disappointed.

You, can’t, you’d have to use something like photoshop. cut each one of them out, and then manually put them together.

Xcom.1926:

My opinion on GW2. It has the foundation to be a solid 10. An amazing game. But to me right now with temp content, and 2-week minigames with bugs, gear grinding, dailies, farming, no incentive to PvP, bad ranking in WvW etc.

The devs are taking a piece of art and banging it on the wall repeatedly. It is so painful to watch. But I do have hope. I like what they did with Tequatl and I like the most recent perm dungeon patch.

I hope they keep up with this perma content and get rid of the temp mini-games. Then the game can become what it should.

If they got rid of the mini stuff and kept the dungeons, they’d probably lose more people than if they got rid of the dungeons and kept the minigame stuff.

Most people don’t really want challenging content, even though they say they do.

The whole point of the team UI is to give you information to help your team. You can always see when you’re losing health and what conditions and boons you have. The idea is to be able to see the team’s information, so you can heal or rez or buff or remove conditions.

The amount of extra screen real estate taken up by your portrait is neither helpful nor, to me, desirable.

Because they’re learning how to program this new paradigm. It takes time to learn. Just like the early trinity fights were quite boring and all tank and spank and then it built on itself to get later fights.

It’s like how the first games that come out for new consoles that no one knows how to program for are never as good as later games that learn how to use the language.

We’re in unchartered territory or at least rarely charted territory and it will take time for the programmers to figure out what they can do.

I expect more and better non trinity battles in the future.

Knighthonor.4061:

The trinity is needed. But Anet will likely add it in the first Expansion. So no worries.

The trinity isn’t needed nor is it desired. Anet will not be adding the trinity. I really hope this was a troll post.

Every time I’ve used the looking for group tool (which isn’t often admittedly), my party fills up inside two minutes.

Every time you try to enter a dungeon there’s a new option that takes you right to the LFG tool as well.

I think it’s fine.

Mesket.5728:

This game will simply lose players that are fond to role playing games simply because this game is not a role playing game. Nobody has a role in a group.

Gah! And I repeat….gah!

Do you really REALLY think RPGs are about playing roles in combat like healer, tank, DPS? That’s not what role-playing is.

Actors play roles (ie, they are role-playing) and I’m pretty sure Sean Connery never healed or tanked in his life.

The idea of role playing is just that…taking on a character. That’s why you have single player RPGs that have no tanks, no healers, and no DPS. Skyrim is an RPG and I never tanked in it…I played a role.

I should also mention that roles are more about flavor than mechanics. You play a necromancer because you want something dark and mysterious (not because you want to DPS). You play a warrior because you want to be up front and personal and kick kitten.

Seriously, people have lost all concept of what an RPG is supposed to be.

Because when/if they nerf guardian, everyone who thinks like you do will be totally screwed. At any rate, most of the world is easy enough and some people like to challenge themselves…not everyone, but some people.

Heart vendors were meant to help you gear up as you were leveling. That’s it. They replace quest rewards in other games, since DEs don’t reward items. In most games you get your items from a quest reward and that quest is never active again. In Guild Wars 2, that function as moved to hearts.

They’re not supposed to offer much more than leveling upgrades as you level.

I still think not having a holy trinity can’t compete with the holy trinity development of many years by many companies, unless people continue to develop stuff to replace it. It was never going to happen overnight. It’s like all early trinity fights were basically tank and spank until people got tired of it and then it went to other things. When you design, you stand on the shoulders of the guy who designed before you. For a multiplayer MMO this is almost uncharted territory. Stuff has to be tried, it has to fail, it has to be refined over and over again for years before a true “replacement” for the trinity is found. It was never going to happen on day one or even in year one. But it will happen.

The other side of the coin is development. The trinity doesn’t just hamstring players into roles, but it hamstrings developers to make content for those roles. If SOMEONE doesn’t get away from the trinity, we’ll never know as players what else could be there.

I didn’t read it all.

But I will say this. Removal of the trinity doesn’t mean no team work….it only means no team work for how it’s done here. Arguably there is more team work in dungeons like the new TA path and of course stuff like Tequatl.

Remember, without a trinity, the development process has to evolve. We’ve had years and years and years of people developing for a trinity and not years and years and years of people developing without a trinity.

I personally believe the trinity is dead…it just doesn’t know it yet….but here’s my problem with the trinity.

If Lord of the Rings was written so that the enemy only attacked Boromir while Gandalf healed him, it would have sucked.

It sucks waiting for healers. I sucks waiting for tanks. It sucks when you have to depend on people who may or may not be good.

Oh and pro tip. If you play with the same people over and over instead of pugging, ie join a guild, there’s plenty of teamwork to be had.

morrolan.9608:

eisberg.2379:

3 days after the manifesto to give clarification on the very stuff people have been bringing up lately isn’t a timely manner?

Well if what Vayne says is the clarification then what people are bringing up is stuff that wasn’t clarified and therefore people are still holding them to it.

Vayne.8563:

Today, the only people who really complain about the manifesto are the people who are ignoring the other stuff. But back then, when it was made, there WAS no other stuff.

Wrong, the majority of the marketing was similar to the manifesto, look at the blog about fun for another example.

You bring up one blog post and call that a majority of the marketing. I’d call that an exaggeration.

Fact…dynamic events were explained again and again and again in detail.

Fact…the personal story was explained again and again and again in detail.

Fact..there are entire sections on the page about how weapons are used, about dynamic events, about personal story.

Fact…if all your information about dynamic events, personal story and skills are from the manifesto, you didn’t do enough research into the game.

Fact…the information about the clarification is in the subsequent information about personal stories and dynamic event.

Fact…the majority of marketing, that is to say take all the marketing and lay it all out side by side, was not about vertical progression or about anything to do with grind. It wasn’t about how this game was like Guild Wars 1 either.

Everyone is quoting throwaway lines, single lines and saying things like this is the majority of the marketing.

No. The majority of the marketing was centered around dynamic events (which are in the game), personal story (which is in the game), a living breathing world (which is in the game via things like ambient spoken dialogue and things changing. I often go into zones and find something I didn’t find last time).

That’s the majority of the marketing. Just poll it yourself, you’ll see.

Tachenon.5270:

Vayne.8563:

Tachenon.5270:

eisberg.2379:

Oldbugga.7029:

No matter how much the cheer squad try to deflect people’s thoughts on the “manifesto” it remains :

1. A published statement of their intended meta for the game.
2. People believed ANet would be able to deliver on what were pretty clear statements of intent.
3. Many people made their purchase of the game on those beliefs.
4. People are ENTITLED to voice their disappointment that the game does not meet their expectations created by 1 and 2 and 3.
5. ANet has failed in communicating changes in a meaningful and timely fashion.
6. Player communications are largely ignored.
7. Players feel abandoned on many issues, ie play breaking bugs which have been evident since beta…this destroys player confidence in the development team…especially when they are not even acknowledged.
8. As a result of a lot of these issues, rightly or wrongly, people have lost trust in ANet to deliver.

People are allowed to feel misled and voice that opinion, and should not be howled down for doing so.

All the counterposts and weaving will NOT change how people FEEL.

The old sayings “words are cheap” and “actions speak louder than words” may hold more truth here than they appear to.

3 days after the manifesto to give clarification on the very stuff people have been bringing up lately isn’t a timely manner? 3 years ago Anet gave clarification on what they were talking about in the manifesto, and 3 years later people are saying that Anet lied, even though Anet gave clarification 3 years ago. Not Anets fault that people decided to watch JUST the manifesto but never read anything else from them in 2 years prior to the release of the game.

The Manifesto is to this day easily found on the GW2 website. Can you find the clarification there? Go look. But be warned: even Manifestopholes had difficulty tracking down a copy of the Sacred Writ of Clarification.

Right, because it’s, ready for this…three years old.

The clarification was released BEFORE the dozens of other interviews and articles that tell specifically what a dynamic event is and what the personal story is. It was NEEDED back then.

Today, the only people who really complain about the manifesto are the people who are ignoring the other stuff. But back then, when it was made, there WAS no other stuff.

You have entire pages on the website describing exactly what’s going on in game. Videos from conventions. Fan sites explaining.

And you still can’t tell the difference between a dynamic event and personal story?

Give me a break.

No, sir. Not while that pretentiously pesky video with all its misleading ‘editorial blunders’ (hah!) still sits there all visible and stuff. Until it’s removed from the GW2 site (like the subsequent clarification) or redone (as it should have been in the first place, given that it was so poorly presented it needed immediate clarification), no breaks will be given.

Seylah!

No breaks will be given? LMFAO!

I don’t actually see Anet asking for a break from you. There are like a handful of people who live in the past, wish this was Guild Wars 1, and look at a 3 year old five minute video and try to make it like it’s some sort of holy manuscript that can never change. And to be sure, less of it has actually changed than people are implying.

Anet doesn’t need to remove it from their webpage. It’s like anything else is the world that people are unreasonable about. They’ll complain about it. And the rest of us will shrug our shoulders because in the end, it all comes to nothing.

Henge.3907:

So if they posted on this forum saying “We lied about some stuff” you’d all be sated? I’m pretty happy with whatever it was for the CE. I also enjoyed it so much I purchased 3-5 regular copies for friends and family. I play a bit less frequently than I did before but I think that everyone who’s still preaching the manifesto is ridiculous. Things happen in life and companies that don’t work and have to be revised. This is true with everything. Maybe some things can be added later and some can’t due to whatever reason. I’ve got my moneys worth.

Seriously though, its been a year and people are still crying about the manifesto. Grow up or move on already.

Actually it’s been three years since the manifesto came out. Apparently nothing at all has happened since then.

Galphar.3901:

Here are the ones that jumped out at me

1. Catering Only to High Levels and End Game – It actually worked in GW. But Gw also only had 20 levels and the endgame was PvP mostly.

7. Shafting Veteran Players. – With GW2 this includes the GW vets. And boy did we get shafted. Everything that we loved about GW and were PROMISED would be in GW2 is gone. No GvG, 80 is cap not 20, gear grind, no templates for builds, 25% amount of skills that we had in GW: Prophecies, etc.

Clearly from the point of view of a PvPer…and I’d understand why. But the end game in Guild Wars 1 wasn’t mostly PvP. It may very well have started out that way, but in the later installments, no PvP at all was introduced. Instead you got DOA and Slaver’s Exile.

Anet shifted from a PvP focus to a PvE focus, possibly because more people were playing that format.

Why? Because you could never really hope to catch up in PvP as the meta evolved. It was too hard. The PvP community was not only not welcoming, but it was nasty to noobs. People tried it, got decimated and most people won’t take months to learn a game. PvP in Guild Wars 1 killed itself. It didn’t need Anet to do anything.

We less and less new blood coming in, PvE flourished, and from my PvE point of view, Guild Wars 2 has done okay…not great…but okay. And it’s only a year old.

Only time will tell if it will do better.

I don’t know if I’ll get a third legendary.

Skan.5301:

Vayne.8563:

Tachenon.5270:

eisberg.2379:

Oldbugga.7029:

No matter how much the cheer squad try to deflect people’s thoughts on the “manifesto” it remains :

1. A published statement of their intended meta for the game.
2. People believed ANet would be able to deliver on what were pretty clear statements of intent.
3. Many people made their purchase of the game on those beliefs.
4. People are ENTITLED to voice their disappointment that the game does not meet their expectations created by 1 and 2 and 3.
5. ANet has failed in communicating changes in a meaningful and timely fashion.
6. Player communications are largely ignored.
7. Players feel abandoned on many issues, ie play breaking bugs which have been evident since beta…this destroys player confidence in the development team…especially when they are not even acknowledged.
8. As a result of a lot of these issues, rightly or wrongly, people have lost trust in ANet to deliver.

People are allowed to feel misled and voice that opinion, and should not be howled down for doing so.

All the counterposts and weaving will NOT change how people FEEL.

The old sayings “words are cheap” and “actions speak louder than words” may hold more truth here than they appear to.

3 days after the manifesto to give clarification on the very stuff people have been bringing up lately isn’t a timely manner? 3 years ago Anet gave clarification on what they were talking about in the manifesto, and 3 years later people are saying that Anet lied, even though Anet gave clarification 3 years ago. Not Anets fault that people decided to watch JUST the manifesto but never read anything else from them in 2 years prior to the release of the game.

The Manifesto is to this day easily found on the GW2 website. Can you find the clarification there? Go look. But be warned: even Manifestopholes had difficulty tracking down a copy of the Sacred Writ of Clarification.

Right, because it’s, ready for this…three years old.

The clarification was released BEFORE the dozens of other interviews and articles that tell specifically what a dynamic event is and what the personal story is. It was NEEDED back then.

Today, the only people who really complain about the manifesto are the people who are ignoring the other stuff. But back then, when it was made, there WAS no other stuff.

You have entire pages on the website describing exactly what’s going on in game. Videos from conventions. Fan sites explaining.

And you still can’t tell the difference between a dynamic event and personal story?

Give me a break.

They could have taken it down instead of using it over and over as a marketing ploy/advertising tool.

Why didn’t they take it down or modify it if they clarified everything? And why weren’t the clarifications thrown in the spotlight as the Manifsto was?

Because they couldn’t look 3 years into the future and expect that people would act like this. It’s ridiculous.

Even if the game doesn’t match something written 3 years ago, I believe most people do know that MMOs evolve and change. And since the manifesto does mention stuff like vertical progression, the change from the manifesto to what we have is miniscule compared to what people are making it.

And they ARE ignoring everything published about the game subsequently. At the very least that makes them bad consumers (or good consumers if you’re a corporation I suppose).

Gratz and good job.

I don’t know if I’d call Guild Wars 2 amazing. It may feel amazing because most MMOs suck badly. I think it’s pretty good, though. It needs to get a lot better before it’s amazing to me.

Tachenon.5270:

eisberg.2379:

Oldbugga.7029:

No matter how much the cheer squad try to deflect people’s thoughts on the “manifesto” it remains :

1. A published statement of their intended meta for the game.
2. People believed ANet would be able to deliver on what were pretty clear statements of intent.
3. Many people made their purchase of the game on those beliefs.
4. People are ENTITLED to voice their disappointment that the game does not meet their expectations created by 1 and 2 and 3.
5. ANet has failed in communicating changes in a meaningful and timely fashion.
6. Player communications are largely ignored.
7. Players feel abandoned on many issues, ie play breaking bugs which have been evident since beta…this destroys player confidence in the development team…especially when they are not even acknowledged.
8. As a result of a lot of these issues, rightly or wrongly, people have lost trust in ANet to deliver.

People are allowed to feel misled and voice that opinion, and should not be howled down for doing so.

All the counterposts and weaving will NOT change how people FEEL.

The old sayings “words are cheap” and “actions speak louder than words” may hold more truth here than they appear to.

3 days after the manifesto to give clarification on the very stuff people have been bringing up lately isn’t a timely manner? 3 years ago Anet gave clarification on what they were talking about in the manifesto, and 3 years later people are saying that Anet lied, even though Anet gave clarification 3 years ago. Not Anets fault that people decided to watch JUST the manifesto but never read anything else from them in 2 years prior to the release of the game.

The Manifesto is to this day easily found on the GW2 website. Can you find the clarification there? Go look. But be warned: even Manifestopholes had difficulty tracking down a copy of the Sacred Writ of Clarification.

Right, because it’s, ready for this…three years old.

The clarification was released BEFORE the dozens of other interviews and articles that tell specifically what a dynamic event is and what the personal story is. It was NEEDED back then.

Today, the only people who really complain about the manifesto are the people who are ignoring the other stuff. But back then, when it was made, there WAS no other stuff.

You have entire pages on the website describing exactly what’s going on in game. Videos from conventions. Fan sites explaining.

And you still can’t tell the difference between a dynamic event and personal story?

Give me a break.

SpyderArachnid.5619:

Galphar.3901:

Here’s something you have to remember, Anet didn’t release Factions until 2 years after Prophecies and it took them 1 year to release the Stone Summit patch. It wasn’t until after the success of the Stone Summit patch that hey decided to finish up Factions for release. When they announce Factions they also announced that they’d be doing a Standalone every 6 months for GW. We ended up getting Nightfall 6 months after Factions and EotN a year after. Then Anet announced GW2 and here we are.

Umm what?

Factions was released exactly one year after Prophecies. Guild Wars: Prophecies was released on April 28th, of 2005. While Guild Wars: Factions was released on April 28th, of 2006. The Stone Summit (or Sorrow’s Furnace) was released on September 7th, of 2005. Six months after Guild Wars’ initial release.

And Factions wasn’t even an expansion. It was an entirely new Campaign like Prophecies. Basically a whole new game. Released within a year.

And Guild Wars 2 had more content at launch than Factions and Prophecies put together.

Everyone knows the game launched too early. They spent the first year getting it to where it is now, which is playable. This project is so much bigger and more ambitious than Guild Wars 1, you might as well not try to compare.

50 devs vs 300. 25 missions in Prophecies and 13 missions in Factions compared to how many personal stories?

How many starting zones in the two games.

Hell people finished Factions in 1 week and complained there was nothing to do. One week!

Harper.4173:

As a GW1 fan, and a 4 year player of GW1 I’ve got a few things that I dislike about GW2.
A lot of things are done right ( Combat, dodging,visuals) but a lot of them are unpolished or just bad.
Let me explain.

This game lacks solid and interesting LORE. You can argue that the diluted and washed-up Personal story was fun. It was not. I remember cherishing every moment of the Prophecies story line. Not here. I just wanted it over with.

What about Living Story ? A joke really. Is Scarlet supposed to be a substitute for Joko or Dhuum? I think not.

Let’s talk GW1 loyalty – who here doesn’t like Ascalon?
I realize in order to make GW2 work they needed to give the Charr some space and all that but to turn it around 180 degrees and make Ascalonians the bad guys is absurd.
I – to this day cannot stand the charr. I dislike everything about them. The way they turned it around – and now the humans are the evil ones- that’s just pathetic.
“Oh it was always the flame legion, the rest of the charr were great” -give me a break.

We need Guild Halls. We need GvG.
Guild Halls and CAPES were some of the strongest reasons being in a guild in GW1 was so awesome. I don’t understand how they released this game with NO halls. Really.

You know what other stuff we’re lacking here?
FOW!
UW!
Where are these absolutely amazing areas. Imagine them rendered through the GW2 engine. Imagine going back and attempting new challenges in an old and familiar environment. Imagine the joy of exploration for new players.

The atmosphere – where has that gone? GW2’s fun and jokes atmosphere is a stark contrast to the more serious, down to earth GW1. And yes there was fun in GW1 but it was on the sidelines- there if you looked for it.

Where is the challenge? Where are the elite areas that will kick you if you wipe? Where’s the build diversity? Why must I have 5 skills tied to my weapon instead of having a POOL of skills tied to my weapon?

Why is it that as a Warrior I only have 2 viable elite skills? Where’s the skill diversity?

Where are the great armor designs that we loved in GW1? Why haven’t they been brought back? Instead we get terrible Aetherblade skins. Who wears those?
We get TOWN CLOTHES – never seen anyone wear them – instead of new armor / weapon skins. I would be ok with these being in the gem store . really . Just bring something new and awesome for a change.

Where is the party leader option – so i can form and manage my OWN party instead of this votekick. ( I start a party with 1 friend – we pug 3 more – midway through the dungeons pugs kick my friend – how is that alright?)

I would have much more to add but it is late and I am tired.
The bottom line is that as a former GW1 player i feel that GW2 borrows its name, setting, a bit of lore and a very limited vision of what GW1 was.

For a Guild Wars 1 player you sure don’t know a lot about Guild Wars 1. Take the charr turnaround. That started Eye of with the North. The Flame Legion are the bad guys to the charr, but the charr in Guild Wars 2 aren’t warm and friendly with the humans. It’s a true, not an alliance.

Story line of Prophecies? Pedestrian. Far too many time sync stupid missions. Most of the Southern Shiverpeakes. A good portion of Maguuma. Did you really get surprised that the White Mantle were bad guys? Why is my character stupider than I am.

You need to get those rose-colored glasses off and look at what’s there.

chemiclord.3978:

eisberg.2379:

3 days after the manifesto to give clarification on the very stuff people have been bringing up lately isn’t a timely manner? 3 years ago Anet gave clarification on what they were talking about in the manifesto, and 3 years later people are saying that Anet lied, even though Anet gave clarification 3 years ago. Not Anets fault that people decided to watch JUST the manifesto but never read anything else from them in 2 years prior to the release of the game.

That kinda IS Arena.net’s problem… because they should know how people are.

When a publication runs a massive headline that turns out erroneous, how many people actually read the very small correction the publication makes on the back page a day later? You can even directly SHOW people where the correction is, and a good many of them won’t believe it because it isn’t in big print on the front page.

If you’re going to offer clarification and/or corrections, you kinda have to make it as big and as loud as the original statements if you expect people to process and retain it.

It wasn’t a very small correction. First of all, that correction was around for well over a year. Subsequently Anet went into tremendous detail about dynamic events, about personal story…and anyone who followed the game knew pretty much what they were about.

There’s no one you can sound bite the dynamic event system. But they did a good job of explaining that events would repeat. And they did a good job in explaining the personal story. Sure the manifesto, all five minutes of it, was sound bites. It was five minutes to describe an entire game. They did what they could in that time.

The detail followed…and there was plenty of it.

champ.7021:

Vayne.8563:

champ.7021:

ascended saved the game…..you know what else would have saved the game….cantha or new areas. But they shot themselves in the foot by sticking with LS instead of working on expanding the area and now they have to keep the grind up until they can bring out a new area or something.

There’s a whole lot of assumptions here on both parts. However, my assumptions are based on stuff said or done by the devs.

First of all, are you suggesting that it takes less time to make Cantha than institute some personal progression?

If people were leaving of the game back in November (which seemed to be the case) and they needed a quick fix, what in the world makes you think Cantha would have been ready in time to save the game?

The ascended gear was introduced as a panicked measure to dwindling numbers. I’m pretty sure they’d have needed a solution that was faster to implement.

Thats not what i said. I said that introducing permanent new areas consistantly would have kept the palyers playing. Instead they went with ls and people stopped playing either because of AP grind and dailies or boredom. Then they had to make the decision for ascended. Now its too late to go back but its not too late for them to start making some permanent additions. For the last few months there have been so many threads on whether ls is the right way for them to go. I mean people were leaving in november and continued to leave to this day. They just made ascended weapons i mean by this time they could have opened up the crystal desert or if they had told us that they were going to be working on cantha/ new areas earlier on i bet less people would leave.

The amount of work it takes to make a permanent area is STILL prohibitive. It takes more work. More time. By the time they could institute any new area, the game would have been a ghost town…or so they probably believed…and I’m not sure they’re wrong.

There were already 25 areas. They thought that would last people much longer than it did. How can you, in your wildest imagination, believe that they could keep up with new areas as fast as people consume them.

I say it’s not possible. Would it be better? Sure it would. Would it be possible? I sincerely doubt it.

champ.7021:

ascended saved the game…..you know what else would have saved the game….cantha or new areas. But they shot themselves in the foot by sticking with LS instead of working on expanding the area and now they have to keep the grind up until they can bring out a new area or something.

There’s a whole lot of assumptions here on both parts. However, my assumptions are based on stuff said or done by the devs.

First of all, are you suggesting that it takes less time to make Cantha than institute some personal progression?

If people were leaving of the game back in November (which seemed to be the case) and they needed a quick fix, what in the world makes you think Cantha would have been ready in time to save the game?

The ascended gear was introduced as a panicked measure to dwindling numbers. I’m pretty sure they’d have needed a solution that was faster to implement.

Yumiko Ishida.3769:

Vayne.8563:

Relentliss.2170:

Vayne.8563:

clint.5681:

I love gw1 but they better not add heros/henchmen. Killed all grouping in gw1

And this is the problem of "everything you love about Guild Wars 1. Here’s a Guild Wars 1 player who doesn’t want heroes and henchmen, yet we’ve seen people on this forum who loved having access to heroes and henchmen and have asked for them to be brought into the game.

There isn’t just one type of Guild Wars 1 fan..there are many and they don’t all necessarily want the same things.

When I ask people to tell me what they loved about GW1 it usually the awesome classes, the awesome skills and builds they used, the awesome times pvping, the builds they used to beat certain dungeons and get rewards they were proud of. WHERE THE kitten IS ANY OF THAT? All I got on my PC is WOW jr with an Aion grind and dodging.

We must have played with different people. While I was the only “build guy” in my guild, I’m pretty sure most people went to PvX wiki, got a build and never thought twice about it.

The guys who loved to build are few and far between and generally far more attached to Guild Wars 1 than the average casual player. It’s like theorycrafters in other games. Min/maxers. They’re never the majority…for a reason. You have to have that mindset and be pretty intelligent. Most games are of average intelligence and don’t delve that deeply into the game. So you talk to the top 15, maybe 20 percent and sure. They loved it.

What about the other percentage that just logs in and plays and pretty much takes things at face value?

Guild Wars 1 was called build wars for a reason, and those builds were both the strength and the downfall of the game. Anet changed it for a reason and the reason they changed it is valid…in my opinion.

Is it as much fun, build-wise? No.

But they were very up front with exactly what builds in this game would be like long before launch.

May times this! Its so much harder to have that mindset happen here and oh so happy for it! It still exists, but it almost a non-mention by players. I rarely every see in /map if ever, “What’s a good [trait] build for profession X or Y or Z (mainly cause zerker lol)?” When in gw 1, I always saw, “ping build plz” or “go to PvX” or people spammed builds in all channels. I usually used a mix of shared PvX builds and my own modifications (guilty as well) or, near the end of my gw 1 life (7 years), I made my own 7 hero team build. And I hated Discordway and sabway, it was cheap and uninspired and never used them or hated those that did.

As for heroes and henchmen, I for one wanted them gone! I wanted to play with others exlcusively. And In gw2, we still don’t play with anyone unless you run x armor set or build their way (or do wvw/sPvP)! It hasn’t changed at all frankly from GW 1. Its just a new version of the same dreaded animal that refuses to die or be put down.

And this is why I say no one should talk for the Guild Wars 1 community as if they’re the voice of the community. The game had so many diverse player types, most of whom couldn’t agree on anything.